Screen Sharing – presentation/slideshow

Three things to try to avoid saying

1. “Oh, sorry, I can’t find it … just a moment … while I …” – prepare, prepare, prepare
2. “I hope I can make this work” – if you can, try to avoid saying this. While there may be an empathy in the “room” for using (struggling with) technology and Zoom, it doesn’t inspire confidence in you as a presenter. So practise, practise, practise. And you can even practise on your own with your computer (as you) and your smart phone (as a participant) – see Using multiple devices on a Zoom event
3. “Can everyone see that okay?” – test it before the meeting with a colleague and/or co-host – and ask someone in the meeting to be your “spotter”. They will interrupt you if they can’t see (or can’t see properly) your presentation or the wrong slide. So you can assume things are working unless they say something.

Warning – they may miss you

If you share the screen for too long or it becomes irrelevant to what you’re covering it’s good to come back to your speaking face.

Remember that some people may be using tablets (with smaller screens) or even mobiles (with very small screens) – so remember KISS – keep it simple – not too much text, use a large font and zoom in where possible.

As slideshows are designed to be in Landscape mode, remind participants using tablets and phones to turn their devices on their side to make the most of their screen.

Participants view (computers and laptops only)

They should initially see the screen share on the left, side-by-side with a grid of participants on the right …

And they can click and drag the dividing line between them, to make one or other take more screen space.

If the participants’ videos are along the top of their screen, they can click ‘View Options’ at the top of their screen (next to the green message – “you are viewing XXX’s screen”) and then click on ‘Side-by-side mode’ …

Help from Zoom on Side by Side Mode for Screen Sharing

If they still can’t see the dividing line, but the videos are down the right side (e.g. MacBook pro seemed to have this problem) – still get them to go click ‘View Options’ at the top of their screen (next to the green message – “you are viewing XXX’s screen”) and then click on ‘Side-by-side mode’

There are three main areas involved in a slide show …

1. Presenter – the person doing the speaking
2. Slides – controlling the slideshow (and therefore doing the Zoom screen share)
3. Meeting – keeping an eye on the Zoom participants (watching Chat, Mute/Unmute, raised hands etc)

One person can do all this. But the presenter will probably be more present, fluid and entertaining if they are free to focus on just speaking.

Consider doing away with animations (e.g. where each bullet point comes in separately), so if/when someone else is controlling the slides, all you need is “next slide please” or “next please”.

Article on Screen sharing a PowerPoint presentation [PC]

Article on screen sharing a Keynote presentation [Mac]

Youtube video – excellent idea showing how to display slideshow (without any animations) [9 min]

Another good video about screen sharing a presentation

Powerpoint has three main views

1. Normal View
2. SlideShow View (Full screen or in a separate Window)
3. Presenter View (available only if slideshow is in Full Screen mode)

When you’re ready to do a slideshow you can control whether its ‘Full screen’ or in a ‘Window’ through ‘Slide Show’ and ‘Set Up Slide Show’

‘Full screen’ allows you to choose which monitor to display the slide show on – and whether to use ‘Presenter View’ or not

If you have two screens

If you have two monitors (that is, your computer or laptop AND a second monitor/screen) you can have your PowerPoint control window in one and the actual presentation in the other (which you can then share in Zoom) …

If you only have one screen

There are multiple ways to manage this – depending upon what you need to see while you’re screen sharing

PowerPoint in full screen display

Preparation

• Open PowerPoint
• Start slideshow
• Alt+Tab to switch back to Zoom

SlideShow

• Share “Window”
• Do NOT optimise for video
• Display Chat etc as needed
• Use left and right arrow to move through slides (or grey controls bottom left)

You can’t see your PowerPoint notes

PowerPoint in Window mode

Preparation

• Open PowerPoint
• Start slideshow
• Alt+Tab to switch back to Zoom
• Share Window
• Do NOT optimise for video
• Display Chat etc as needed
• Use left and right arrow to move through slides (or grey controls bottom left)

PowerPoint in Normal View – screen share region

Preparation

• Open PowerPoint
• In Zoom …
• Click ‘Screen Share’ button
• Click ‘Advanced’ Tab
• Click ‘Portion of Screen’
• Click ‘Share’
• You’ll now see a green rectangle …
  • click-and-drag the top to move it round your screen
  • click-and-drag the edges to change it’s size

Traps to avoid

• If your presentation has any audio (music or video) it will come out distorted for people – unless you tick the right box – click here for details
• If your presentation has any video and you tick ‘Optimise for video’ to make it run smoother – any Zoom “elements” that sit over the video (Zoom’s menu, chat window, participants videos) will interfere with the screen share and show up as grey boxes on people’s screen